With every image of the dead in Gaza inflaming people across the Arab world, Egyptian and Jordanian officials are worried that they see a fundamental tenet of the Middle East peace process slipping away: the so-called two-state solution, an independent Palestinian state coexisting with Israel.
Egypt and Jordan fear that they will be pressed to absorb the Palestinian populations now living beyond their borders. If Israel does not assume responsibility for humanitarian aid in Gaza, for example, pressure could compel Egypt to fill the vacuum; Jordan, in turn, worries that Israel will try to push Palestinians from the West Bank into its territory.
In that case, both states fear, they could become responsible for policing the conflict between the Palestinians and Israel, undermining their peace treaties with Israel.
RE: “If Israel does not assume responsibility for humanitarian aid in Gaza, for example, pressure could compel Egypt to fill the vacuum . . . . ”
Oh no. What a crisis! Isn’t there some UN resolution that could make Israel do it?
Heh, Sarah. If the Arab world had to pay the bills for all these refugees for the past sixty years, they’d have been resettled long ago. Gaza and West Bank residents have been used by the Arab countries as political pawns for six decades. Time for them to take the major responsibility for the situation they have willingly helped create.
More constructively, there’s no reason that the Arab countries’ involvement would remove the possibility of a Palestinian state eventually. A few years of Egyptian governance in Gaza, the way Egypt is governed, where protests are outlawed and Muslim Brotherhood radicals are regularly thrown in jail to rot or be tortured, and broadcast media and print media are censored, would put a stop to the radical agitating and perhaps help the populace to begin focusing on living and not just on killing the neighbors. That’s what needed for a “state” to make any sense.
I agree with the end of Katherine’s posting no 3 above. Numerous times I have recalled with great sadness how the Camp David agreements nearly brought a permanent solution. But extremist Israelis assassinated Rabin, and Arafat turned out to be just what we all suspected: a silly, narcissistic and corrupt politician, at the very moment when his people needed a statesman. Since I have been somewhat critical of Israel elsewhere on this blog, to correct the balance I note here something often forgotten: for a time, in keeping with the agreements, the Israelis opened a dedicated road between Gaza and the West Bank. People could travel freely between the two, and remember, Gaza is small and crowded. For a moment statehood beckoned. Then hope crumbled away. Regarding the Arab world paying the bills, actually, Katherine is wrong. Enormous sums have gone to Palestine, especially from the Gulf States and to a lesser extent Saudi Arabia. Some was spent on the infrastructure of government (those rather impressive adminstrative buildings recently bombed in Gaza). A lot went on housing. Visitors to Jericho will remember that as recently as 20 years ago there was a vast refugee camp outside. Now all gone, and the people rehoused in places like Ramallah. Around Bethlehem the Palestinian Authority has been trying to outbuild the Jewish settlements at nearby Har Homa – Shepherds Fields is in danger of being engulfed (sorry, accidental pun). The tax base of the PA is small, so most of this money has come from other Arab states. But, but, but … an awful lot of the money has been siphoned off by corrupt Fatah officials, which is one of the reasons that Hamas began to win support, despite its brutal and extremist nature.
Terry Tee, it’s a pleasure to agree with you for the most part. Nobody sensible wants to see the continuation of the bloodshed, year after year, decade after decade. You’re right, a lot of Arab money goes in, although I’m not convinced it’s more than the Western money also going in. But if the Arab countries really wanted to supply Gaza’s humanitarian needs, fuel needs, etc., it could very easily do so through the border with Egypt. And Hamas, which came to power in Gaza on the anti-corruption agenda, has proved just as bad as the other guys, according to reports, siphoning off money and supplies both in wartime and during truces. If Israel hands Gaza back to Fatah, Fatah had better try to get its act together. We can hope.
The Egyptian foreign minister recently made the laughable statement that “obviously” the tunnels were not for smuggling arms but only for food. Food is sent in overland. The tunnels are for contraband.
Perhaps now Palestinians will try to work for a one-state solution and seek citizenship in Israel.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1011859.html
John,
That won’t work. Israel will cease to be a Jewish state. For Israel to continue to exist as a Jewish, democratic and modestly socialist/secular state (the three things Zionists wanted), the only option is two-state. The demographics of the region would suggest Israeli Arabs could potentially vote away the state of Israel were the one-state solution accepted.
I’m pretty sure Hamas is interested in a one-state solution, too, given their charter’s stated aims. There seems to be a lot of [url=http://www.fivefeetoffury.com/:entry:fivefeet-2009-01-11-0000/]support[/url] (warning: language…it’s Leftists we’re dealing with) for that final solution among the tolerant, broad-minded set in the West, too.
Isaac, it is more complicated than that. Israeli Arabs in the North, especially in Galilee, have prospered greatly. They are unlikely to vote against their wallets. Almost despite itself there are signs of an Israeli Arab identity emerging (eg the use of Hebrew, or Ivrit, words in everyday Arab speech, some words, bizarrely, even from army slang). The Arab population of East Jerusalem is very different: most have refused Israeli citizenship. Not surprising, given that they are denied permission to build new houses, and where they do, they are torn down. Their anger is understandable as they see Jewish immigrants from the rest of the world accommodated handsomely on confiscated land.
The demographic time bomb is a little exaggerated. The charedim or strictly Orthodox Jews have families just as large as the Israeli Arabs, and anyway in the North the Israeli Arab family size is really quite modest. (BTW Christians may not be aware that the term Ultra Orthodox, although used in the media, is often considered pejorative and should be avoided.) In Arab Jerusalem certainly it is a case of what the Quebeckers used to call the revenge of the cradle, but, as I said, the strictly Orthodox are as fertile as anyone else. As for the people of the West Bank and Gaza opting for Israeli citizenship: we may expect the underworld to freeze over first.
When a country is prosperous, people have fewer children: unless its like Iceland and the state supports child-bearing women.
#7 You may be right. A secular binational state, however, would mean that Jewish Fundamentalists and Islamic fundamentalists would be curtailed by secular Jews and Arabs. Which would a nice thing in the middle east. There was a time when Lebanon lived fairly peacefully with three different groups….
Here is one proposal that many Israelis and Palestinians supported:
http://www.cmep.org/documents/peoplesvoice.htm
Thanks for the correction on “ultra” for the Orthodox, which I have used from time to time with no offense intended. “Strict” Orthodox works just as well.
Terry,
Oh of course it’s more complicated than that. And I hate relying on demographic arguments that reduce ‘the other side’ (which ever one that is in this situation) to something less than human; animals that do nothing but breed and kill us. What I am afeared of in the one-state solution is putting Israel in a sitution where it has to choose between being a Jewish state or a democratic state. And that is the eventuality that I think a one-state solution is going to end with.